HOMEBREW Digest #3697 Wed 01 August 2001

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	FORUM ON BEER, HOMEBREWING, AND RELATED ISSUES
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Contents:
  More St. Arnold... ("Bev D. Blackwood II")
  Kegging vs bottling (Denis Bekaert)
  Plague (wayne.aldrich)
  St. Arnold, plague, etc (Pat Babcock)
  Cologne Kolsch Info. ("Bob Hall")
  black death /beer ("Micah Millspaw")
  Where is Burley (Dave Burley)
  The Homemade Beer Book ("Kensler, Paul")
  Beer and Plague and Water ("Patrick Livingood")
  A good use for generic American beer!! ("Wilson, Brian")
  Re: RIMS thermostat + electric brewing (Tony Verhulst)
  Annual Boston Pub Crawl (Ken Jucks)
  Phosphorous (AJ)
  Festibiere (Tom Riddle)

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---------------------------------------------------------------------- Date: Tue, 31 Jul 2001 00:10:59 -0500 From: "Bev D. Blackwood II" <bdb2 at bdb2.com> Subject: More St. Arnold... Just FYI, the local micro in Houston (now the oldest in Texas by attrition... sigh) calls itself St. Arnold and they preach that St. Arnold told his parish to drink beer rather than water since it was more healthy. They name their fermenters after beer/brewing saints and are doing passably well, so they have *someone's* blessing! However, I have been told by no less than Fritz Maytag that St. Nicholas (of Myra) is in fact the patron saint of brewers... That's who Anchor has hung on the wall of their brewhouse! - -- -BDB2 Bev D. Blackwood II http://www.bdb2.com/ Return to table of contents
Date: Mon, 30 Jul 2001 22:24:51 -0700 (PDT) From: Denis Bekaert <Denis-B at rocketmail.com> Subject: Kegging vs bottling Last week I kegged my second beer after bottling for two years and at the time I thought the process was rather quick and easy, although I must admit fraught with fears of blowing my head off with compressed gas or driving a fitting through my thick skull...but, no, it really was easy. So what? Well, tonight I bottled a five gallon batch because I wanted to give it to my Dad since he really loves a wheat beer. Gad, I now realize why kegging is so beloved by homebrewers. When I routinely bottled, I didn't realize just how much extra effort I was spending putting up my precious brews. The moral of the story is this: if you have ever thought that kegging your beer was too big a step, think again...its easy and it will save you an amazing amount of time and effort, which can be better spent dreaming up new brewing projects and sampling your work. Oh, yeah, then there is the extreme pleasure of filling a glass (or two) of your brew right out of a keg...just like being in the local pub except you have no closing hours and your brew is just SO much better than the commercial stuff.... Denis in Beechgrove, Tennessee where Moonshine is our history, but homebrewing is our passion. Return to table of contents
Date: Tue, 31 Jul 2001 03:33:56 -0400 From: wayne.aldrich at dtra.mil Subject: Plague The plague is an enzootic infection of rodents(rats, rabbits) and their fleas. It is spread primarily by bites from the infected fleas. Direct contact with infected rodents and domestic animals can also result in infection. The only other source for infection is via direct contact with the infected droplets from infected humans or animals. So I suppose the boiling of beer wort would kill the bacteria that could have infected the water. A more likely fatal waterborne bacterium that would be eliminated through the brewing process is cholera. Wayne Aldrich Return to table of contents
Date: Tue, 31 Jul 2001 07:16:14 -0400 (EDT) From: Pat Babcock <pbabcock at hbd.org> Subject: St. Arnold, plague, etc Greetings, Beerlings! Take me to your lager... First: I am not a doctor, epidemiologist or historian. Nor do I play any one of these on radio or television. I am, however, interested in both the saints and in the "black death". Here is a slight rewrite from that which I provided Ant via private mail Friday... The bubonic plague is primarily transmitted by fleas which have fed on infected rats. This was the attributed cause of the infamous black death in the 14th century. Sanitation in that era consisted of dumping your garbage wherever available, fostering a huge rat population. A particular species of rat, a black something-or-other rat usually found in forests, carries the bubonic plague. It is thought that a drought at the time drove these rats into the cities to infect the rat population there. Since the city rats were not immune, they eventually died, forcing the fleas they picked up from their country cousins to find new warm-blooded animals to feed on - people. A mild winter then allowed the plague to rage where it would normally have been diminished by the cold. There are other plagues that are primarily pneumonic and septic, but bubonic is primarily pest-borne. Per any reference to substitutes for water, the people of the time had the habit of throwing human waste and whatever other garbage they had laying about into the gutter, or whereever convenient. Recycling, greenhouse effect, the ozone layer and other ecological fears were unknown. Due to this cavalier attitude toward their environment, their trash would get into the rivers and streams and contaminate their water supply - quite different than the plague, but a major contributor to the high mortality rate of the era. Primary result was "dysentery", which was quite deadly at the time. Immodium AD, Donegal, Pepto-Bismal, Kao-pectate are all rather modern remedies to prevent the dehydration that would otherwise result from this condition. Also note that the St. Arnold who is the one accepted as a patron of brewers (St. Arnulf of Metz) lived c580 to c640. The plague was in the 14th century (~1347). It's unlikely that St. Arnold had any physical impact on that event There are many patron saints of brewing, including: Amand, Arnold, Augustine of Hippo, Barbara, Boniface, Florian, Lawrence, Luke the Apostle, Medard, Nicholas of Myra, and Wenceslas. (Note the lack of any "Gambrinus" - though, like St. Arnold, perhaps that is simply another name for a particular aint.) Places to search: for saints: http://www.catholic-forum.com/saints/indexsnt.htm http://saints.catholic.org/index.shtml The Catholic-forum site also has a "by topic" index, which is helpful. St. Arnold: http://www.newadvent.org/cathen/01752b.htm Plague: historical: http://www.humanities.ccny.cuny.edu/history/plague/ technical: http://www.byu.edu/ipt/projects/middleages/LifeTimes/Plague.html http://www2.itexas.net/~jburks/plague.htm tour: http://www.discovery.com/stories/history/blackdeath/instructions.html - -- - See ya! Pat Babcock in SE Michigan pbabcock at hbd.org Home Brew Digest Janitor janitor@hbd.org HBD Web Site http://hbd.org The Home Brew Page http://hbd.org/pbabcock "The monster's back, isn't it?" - Kim Babcock after I emerged from my yeast lab Saturday Return to table of contents
Date: Tue, 31 Jul 2001 07:53:32 -0400 From: "Bob Hall" <rallenhall at hotmail.com> Subject: Cologne Kolsch Info. We hope to be heading to Europe this fall to attend a festival in the Czech town where my wife taught for a year (check out the local brew at www.rebelbeer.com ... has anyone seen it in the US?), then off to visit friends in Germany. One of my goals is to learn more about Kolsch-style brewing while in Cologne. Can anyone recommend an English language brewery tour or other local resource that might be helpful? Also, any recommended brands that are unfiltered/unpasturized that could be "imported" as starters? Many thanks, Bob Hall Return to table of contents
Date: Tue, 31 Jul 2001 07:37:45 -0500 From: "Micah Millspaw" <MMillspa at silganmfg.com> Subject: black death /beer I was thinking that the 'black death' was caused by ergot poisoning. Ergot being a fungus that is found on rye. I recall that it was supposed to cause dementia and a loss of blood circulation in the extremities, resulting the effected areas turning black and rotting off, hence the 'black death'. My beer related question is, did brewing with the ergot infected rye stop the spread of ergot poisoning? I guess that the dementia could be a pleasant side effect [ for a while] Micah Millspaw - brewer at large Return to table of contents
Date: Tue, 31 Jul 2001 09:56:27 -0400 From: Dave Burley <Dave_Burley at compuserve.com> Subject: Where is Burley Brewsters: Bill in malty Golden Colorado asks "where is burley". Burley is trying to spend what time is available getting to pick his first crop of winegrapes ( the Chardonnay are ripe, the Viognier are riper and .....) when he is not in the hospital. Just got out. PITA. Too complicated to explain it here but lots of MDs are eating lobster and steak on my behalf. But thanks to them I'm able to move again and a nasty resudual infection may at last be gone. I'm listening but no time to respond. Thanks for asking. Keep on Brewin' Dave Burley Return to table of contents
Date: Tue, 31 Jul 2001 10:50:19 -0400 From: "Kensler, Paul" <PKensler at cyberstar.com> Subject: The Homemade Beer Book For anyone that's interested in the reprint of the prohibition-era homebrew book that Mark Tumarkin posted about, I found copies of The Homemade Beer Book at www.bibliofind.com <http://www.bibliofind.com> (there's one less available now, as I grabbed one for myself!). That was the first place I tried - I'm sure a search of the web will turn up other used book dealers and used book search engines on the web. Hope this helps, Paul Kensler Gaithersburg, MD Return to table of contents
Date: Tue, 31 Jul 2001 10:49:28 -0400 From: "Patrick Livingood" <patrickl at umich.edu> Subject: Beer and Plague and Water Not to keep this off-topic thread going for too much longer, but this is a topic I have been doing some reading on lately. And I get back on topic at the Fleas who entered Europe on Black rats carried a bacterium called Yersina pestis. When one of these fleas bit a person, they could develop one of three forms of the plague. Most developed bubonic plague, where the lymph nodes swell up to the size of a baseball or a softball and death follows after about a week for 25% to 75% of the victims. A very few people had a liver or spleen that couldn't cope and developed septisemic plague and died after a few hours of high blood toxicity levels. A few other people, who got pneumonic plague, had the bacterium attack their lungs instead of their lymph nodes. They essentially drowned in the fluids that the infected lung produced. And unfortunately for their neighbors, these fluids they were coughing up were extremely contagious. As far as I can tell, if someone then contracted the bacterium from a person with pneumonic plague, they too developed pneumonic plague. And in some of the pandemics, the mortality rate for those infected with the pneumonic form of the disease was close to 100%. So to answer the first email, beer would have had no effect on reducing the infection during a plague epidemic. It only really helps with water-borne illnesses. But, back on topic, since there are so many beer historians on the list. Alcoholic beverages (wine or beer) were common in all pre-Industrial urban areas of the world that I can think of. Presumably some of its success comes from the fact that it makes the water safe to drink. It would seem to me that if you are making beer with the primary intent of making potable water, you would want a low alcohol content beer. Just enough alcohol to kill the nasties, but not too much because the body has to use some water to capture and expel the alcohol. I am wondering if anyone has information on the typical alcohol content of early European beers? And I am wondering if anyone has information on how much water is used to remove alcohol from the body. In short, how much water gain or loss is there with 12 oz. of a 2% alc. beer or a 4% beer, etc? Where is the break-even point? - ----------------------------------------------------------------------- Patrick Livingood Phone: 734-764-7274 University of Michigan Fax: 734-763-7783 Museum of Anthropology E-mail: patrickl at umich.edu Rm. 4009 Museums Building Ann Arbor, MI 48109-1109 - ----------------------------------------------------------------------- Return to table of contents
Date: Tue, 31 Jul 2001 11:23:51 -0400 From: "Wilson, Brian" <BWilson at mail.dos.state.fl.us> Subject: A good use for generic American beer!! At last! A good use for generic American beer! Beer offered to clean Tar Creek By OMER GILLHAM Tulsa World Staff Writer 7/30/01 Tom Harris is stone cold sober when he talks about using stale beer to cleanse the iron-contaminated waters of Tar Creek. Harris, a University of Tulsa chemistry professor, has conducted laboratory experiments that show that a beer-treated wetland would be far more effective in removing heavy metals from runoff water than an untreated wetland. When Harris eventually takes his idea to the orange-hued waters of Tar Creek near Picher, Oklahoma he hopes a local beer distributor will donate its expired lager to the project. The distributor, who wishes to remain anonymous, destroys about $200,000 a year in beer that has not been sold by its expiration date. That is hundreds of gallons of old grog going into the Tulsa sewer works each month, said a distributor spokesman. "The idea kind of fell in my lap at a (cocktail) party," said Harris. "I was talking about using molasses as a (remediation) agent when a friend suggested beer. It struck me as being a remarkable idea." Harris said the sugar-like molecules in beer promote the growth of a "friendly" bacteria that would have a party on the zinc and lead, flowing into a wetland along Tar Creek -- one of the most urgent EPA Superfund sites in the United States. Sulfide, the bacteria's byproduct, is a key player in the remediation effort. Harris said the element would latch onto heavy metals and bond them to a wetland's muddy floor thus leaving cleaner water to wash downstream. He said a beer-treated wetland is a possible low-tech, low-cost solution to just one of the many problems associated with contaminated soil and water caused by decades of zinc mining. "Our research shows that a (beer) wetland could be five to 10 times smaller than a regular wetland and produce many times more of the remediation work," said Harris. However, the strength of the beer-fed bacteria does fade, which means a beer-treated wetland must be loaded up with thousands of gallons of beer periodically. Sent by: Brian Wilson Tallahassee, Florida Return to table of contents
Date: Tue, 31 Jul 2001 12:27:39 -0400 From: Tony Verhulst <verhulst at zk3.dec.com> Subject: Re: RIMS thermostat + electric brewing > Rob Dewhirst posted that the best place for the RIMS thermostat temp. .... > > Rob's right. My first RIMS had only one probe located upstream of the > heater. During one stickly mash, the temp. upstream of the heater reached > something like 20 degF above the desired mash temp. Also, the lag Rob > mentions with only an upstream probe will result in the mash temp. > overshooting the desired rest temp. in roughly inverse proporation to the > flow. The main disavantage of a downstream probe location is that boost > times between rests will be much longer. OTOH, one upstream can better > measure mash temp. This, to me, is one reason why some of us prefer HERMS like systems over RIMS. My system, for instance, has an independent (not tied to the HLT) electric powered heat exchanger. The temperature of the water in the exchanger IS the mash temperature. My one and only temperature sensor is in the heat exchanger itself and not in the wort flow. See my web page at http://www.world.std.com/~verhulst/RIMS/rims.htm. What ever rings your chimes, I guess. cheers, Tony Return to table of contents
Date: Tue, 31 Jul 2001 12:54:23 -0400 (EDT) From: Ken Jucks <jucks at cfa.harvard.edu> Subject: Annual Boston Pub Crawl If you live near or are going to be near Boston on August 11, I encourage you to attend the annual pub crawl of the Boston Wort Processors. The aim of the crawl is to visit many outstanding beer bars and brew pubs from lunch to closing time. Some of the pubs are staples of the crawl and some are lesser known gems with good beer. Some of the establishments go out of their way to welcome us and have special beers on tap. This year's crawl starts at the famous Redbones for lunch, meanders through Cambridge (including Cambridge Brewing Company), into Boston (including Commonwealth and Cornwall's) and into Allston (Northeast and the Sunset Grill). We usually have anywhere from 30 to 50 people in the crowd at any point in time, and many people join the crawl in progress or leave when they are saturated. We stick to a tight schedule. We also discourage anyone from driving during or after the crawl and use the Boston subway system extensively. The only requirements for attendence are that you are at least 21, appreciate good beer, and in a cheerful mood. I assume that most people who read the HBD qualify!!! :^) The itinerary can be found on the web site of the Wort Processors (www.wort.org) in the form of a pdf file. We look forward to meeting some of y'all there! Ken Jucks Return to table of contents
Date: Tue, 31 Jul 2001 17:39:16 +0000 From: AJ <ajdel at mindspring.com> Subject: Phosphorous Indeed grains do contain a fair amount of phosphorous - I think perhaps as much as 2% but don't quote me on that - in the form of salts of phytin which is usually our friend because it is the reaction of these phosphates with calcium in the liquor which sets the pH of the mash into the region we wish it to be. To remove the phosphate one could conceivably increase the calcium ion content and then raise the pH causing the phosphate to precipitate but I can't think of any practical way to do that and then restore the beer to normal pH. A.J. Return to table of contents
Date: Tue, 31 Jul 2001 13:14:59 -0400 From: Tom Riddle <ftr at oracom.com> Subject: Festibiere Does anyone have the inside scoop on the cancelation of Festibiere - the beer festival in Chambly, Quebec ? What are the chances of it's revival next year ? - -- Tom Riddle Portsmouth, NH Return to table of contents
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